Monday morning was another great looking day so we hooked up the wee trailer, made ourselves some coffee and hit the road. The drive south on I-5 was not too bad and for the most part we were able to just put the car on cruise just above the speed limit and take it easy all the way to Portland, well Troutdale actually. We arrived at the Sandy River RV Resort just after noon and Jerry provided us with a spot relatively close to the washrooms as we had requested. Nice shady spot at that. We got all set up and headed off into the bowels (downtown) of Portland. We stopped for lunch at City State Cafe a trendy little place in the Laurelhurst district. Nice.
After lunch we continued downtown to find the Apple store where Kris picked up a new iphone 5 (not the new new ones as they had yet to be announced... that came on Tuesday) and after about an hour of help from two of the techie dweebs we left with our entire iTunes collection loaded. Unfortunately Apple doesn't sell a FM transmitter so we had to look elsewhere for that so we could listen to our music in the car... after all the whole purpose of this "upgrade" was to provide music for this trip and the phone part will come later when we get home and get a new SIM card there. As for the music, the iPhone replaces the two iPods some scummy bugger ripped off from our car a few months ago. After the Apple store we walked across the street to a Radio Shack but they did not have a decent transmitter that would work with the iPhone 5. The fellow there suggested we try Fry's (who knew there was a Fry's in Portland???). That would have to wait until Tuesday. That all taken care of we headed over to Knit Purl so Kris could pick up a new set of knitting needles. Success there as well! What a day...
Tuesday morning we made the coffee for the road and off we went to find Fry's in Wilsonville just south of Portland. We took I-205 and as we approached I-5 a great big flashing sign warned of a traffic accident on I-5 about 6 miles south of where I-205 merges into it... "all lanes closed"... Hmmm... but we only need to go less than 3 miles before the exit we should take... so on we go... alas we hit I-5 and within about a mile the traffic in all lanes ground to a halt and moved at a snail's pace. No wait, a snail would win this one! We opted to bail at the first available exit and to our amazement got on a secondary/frontage road that paralleled the freeway but had nobody on it. It took us all of about 2 minutes to merge back to where we would have been if we had been able to take the proper exit... and the freeway was still pretty much standing still.
Into Fry's we went...directly to the cell phone department to look for a FM transmitter that would work with an iPhone 5. Turns out we had to bounce between the computer department and the cell phone department... but Buddy the salesman finally led us to the appropriate area and helped us pick out the "best one" along with an adapter to allow us to plug into the iPhone 5. Up to the cash, pay for it, go out to the parking lot, rip it all open, hook it up and ... nothing... drat... back into the store; refund and try another one... same thing... another refund...ok, let's try one that hooks into the earphone jack instead... finally success. We had music. Yeah! By this time a good hour had passed and the southbound freeway, which we could see from the Fry's parking lot, was just barely moving... maybe walking speed. Good thing we were now going to be heading north.
We headed north on I-5 to the Bridgeport Village shopping center where we stopped in at a CPK for lunch and a bit of looking around. Then it was back out to Troutdale for a rest and time to do laundry.
Wednesday we awoke to a georgeous day. Not a cloud to be seen. In fact they predicted record temperatures for the day. Such a shame to be leaving Portland this day. Almost a crime really. Pretty well every other time we have been to Portland the last few years it has been, at best, dreary drizzle and at worst pouring rain. Oh well, time to move on. We elect to avoid the interstates again and start out heading south east to Sandy then south west towards Salem. Somewhere around Silverton we miss a turn but keep merrily driving along. After awhile we notice that we seem to be heading in a south easterly direction when we really should be heading south west... hmmm a while later we hit an intersection with OR-214 and decide to turn right and head west on it... our lucky day... this road takes us right onto US-22 West which we didn't plan on hitting until west of Salem... so we were golden, just stayed on this and it took us right through the center of Salem and out the other side exactly where we wanted to be. Ended up only about an hour out of our way... but it was a pretty drive so no harm, no foul. Who needs a GPS??? We just arrived in Lincoln City a bit later than our orignal ETA. The Premier RV Resort was not fully booked so we got a decent spot there. Very convenient location.
We still had time to go look around in the factory outlets before we decided to try the Dory Cove seafood restaurant for dinner. They claim to have a world famous Clam Chowder so, obviously, Brian had to give it a try. Well we can only conclude that it is world famous for having large chunks of flour in it... somebody forgot to stir something... anyway, not the best but the rest of the meal was pretty good seafood. Later we went across the road from the RV park to the Inn at Spanish Head for a couple of glasses of wine in their 10th floor lounge overlooking the water... fabulous view. It's funny when you go into the Inn because the lobby is on the 9th floor and people checking in immediately think that they have to go "up" from the lobby to get to their room on say the 4th floor, but in this case they need to go down. Great confusion and lots of laughter all around!
Thursday we continued down the coast. Stopped in at one of our favorites, Fishpatrick's Crabby Cafe on the dock at Winchester Bay. On this thursday they got hit with an unexpectedly large lunch time crowd. We ended up sitting at the counter and had to wait quite a while but it was a fun atmosphere and the somewhat harried waiter took it all in stride (as did all of the customers... no complaints) and we ended up having another excellent lunch of grilled cod with salad and fish and chips. Yummm. After lunch we went next door to the Sportsmen's Cannery and picked up a couple of cans of tuna, some smoked tuna and their awesome salmon spread for later munchies. We ended the day in Port Orford. We decided to forego our usual stay at the KOA about 12 miles north of town opting instead to try the Port Orford RV Village right on the north edge of the town. Pleasant place well off the highway. Lots of permanents but it appears to be a very sociable group. Chatted with a few folks who have been there at least a couple of years. It seems some of them, after deciding to become full time RVers, got caught when the price of fuel rose and essentially had to find some place to hunker down. They could do a lot worse, in terms of living full time in a "trailer park", that's for sure.
After getting set up we headed into town to another of our favorites for some dinner, the Redfish from where the view will simply never get old...
... and the crab cakes and salad were as excellent as ever. Next door to the restaurant is an art gallery owned by the same folks. Fabulous gallery with many great art works in different media.
Friday we continued south into California, stopping at the usual Chart Room restaurant, on the dock in Crescent City, for another very good grilled seafood and crab louie salad for lunch...
Continuing south through some of the most beautiful redwood forests...
... and came up behind a logging truck carrying 3 of the largest trees you can imagine on one truck...
Our destination for the day was Arcata and we arrived at the Mad River Rapids RV Park by mid afternooon. Afterwards we headed south into Eureka for a wander around the old town area where Kris picked up the usual pack of beads at Talisman Beads. For dinner we finished off the smoked tuna we had bought up in Winchester Bay.
Saturday we decided to stop in Garberville for lunch at the Paradise Grill where we have stopped numerous times before (although last spring it was a bit of a disappointment). Whoa... the place has been taken over by a new owner and is now a "true vegan" place serving only "raw organics". We opted to head down the street and try the Eel River Cafe which has been closed every other time we have gone through town. It was fairly busy (probably from the crowd that would normally have been in the Paradise Grill) and they served up a pretty mean couple of omelettes for our breakfast. And, they have a cool faux skylight in the place...
Ok, so we know we can still stop in Garberville for lunch when the schedule calls for it.
Continuing south we turned off of 101 onto Highway 1 at Leggett and drove the very slow, wiggly road, with many tight switchbacks, over the mountains to the coast and into Fort Bragg, our stop for the next 6 nights. They had a great spot reserved for us at the POMO campground and we settled in quite nicely. After a brief drive around to reacquaint ourselves with the town then, as it was definitely time for a glass of wine, drove down onto the dock at Noyo Harbour to our old favorite Heron's By the Sea... BUT WAIT... it has changed owners, been renamed and the new place doesn't have a liqour license... what the heck good is that? That makes two major changes in one day! Anyway, the new owner told us that Heron's had relocated a few buildings over. Whew... let's go there. BUT WAIT... they are closed! However a quick look around showed a larger patio with a better view of the mouth of the harbour so maybe some good will come of this. We'll have to come back another day. Meanwhile the task at hand is to find a decent glass of wine so off we went to the next place along the dock, but they only serve "chablis" as a white wine. What good is that? So onto the next place where we finally had an "ok" view from the patio and the wine was decent so we made the best of it and enjoyed sitting out in the harbour air with the smell of the ocean. Quite nice really.
Sunday we drove south about 20 minutes to the town of Mendocino. Always a cool look around and as usual we purchased some pre-made salads and had a picnic lunch overlooking the bay south of town. They certainly have some great galleries, albeit a tad on the pricey side, and the MAC (Mendocino Art Center) where we had a stroll through their galleries as well. On the way back to Fort Bragg we took a little side road towards Pt Cabrillo and discovered a neat little beach with an RV park worth checking out. Maybe another day.
For dinner Sunday we drove into Fort Bragg to Piaci Pizza for a pizza and some meatballs to go along with a couple of glasses of "just ok" wine, plonk really. Then back to the RV Park to watch some more Dr Who episodes and to call it a week.
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